Is there a male menopause? As a man in his mid-50s, I have recently become aware of getting older. Increasing age has had a curious effect on my psyche. I am noticing, on an almost daily basis, that I am thinking, feeling and behaving in ways that are starkly different from my youth and earlier adulthood. I will share these experiences on this blog and hope others will join me in describing their own age-related quirks and oddities. I can't be the only one at this "funny age", can I??

Thursday, 24 September 2015

I met the future Mrs Jones 36 years ago at a social-club disco
in the psychiatric hospital where we both worked. We’ve been a partnership ever
since. My love for her strengthens with each passing year, and no one
understands me better (and vice-versa); we often finish each other’s sentences.

Nevertheless, there are several recurrent behaviours my wife
displays that leave me befuddled – perhaps others can inform me whether these
actions are peculiar to Mrs Jones or endemic across the female population.

Moving household items for no apparent reason

Often, I return home and believe,
for an instant, I’ve mistakenly entered the wrong house as some combination of
armchairs, settee, cupboard and coffee table have exchanged places.

On other occasions it is smaller
items that are rearranged. In the shower, while facing the gushing water, the
shampoo was always on the left while the conditioner lived on the right. One
memorable day in July, Mrs Jones swapped them around; it took me three weeks to
realise why I wasn’t working up a lather!

2.

A liking for busy outdoor flea markets

My lady could spend a whole day
rooting through the stalls on an outdoor market, burrowing into the merchandise
in search of a bargain. As for me, I don’t take kindly to the back of my legs
being rammed by prams, my ribs poked by pointed elbows and my personal space
invaded by a frenzied shopper with body odour and bad breath - all for the sake
of buying some crap

Irritation when I leave the toilet seat up

I’ve always struggled to
comprehend the angry reaction to my leaving the toilet seat up. I don’t respond
with fury when I go to splash the porcelain and find the seat down. In a society
of gender equality, shouldn’t she lift it after use so it’s ready for me?

Criticising my dress sense

I accept that selecting matching
clothes to wear is not one of my strong points, so I often depend on Mrs Jones
to choose my outfits. Sometimes she complains, asking - with hands on hips and
indignant expression – ‘do I always have to dress you’. Yet, on the rare
occasions when I strike out for independence by dressing myself she responds,
‘Oh no – that shirt doesn’t match those trousers’. What can a guy do?

Quilt hogging

Throughout the 30-plus years we’ve
slept together, and irrespective of the size of the bed and quilt, there will
usually be a point in the depths of night when Mrs Jones turns over while
clinging to the bedspread as if on the crest of a roller-coaster ride. This
sudden – nay, violent – movement invariably exposes my bare arse to the
elements.

6. Inconsistent spending

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Courtesy of Stuart Miles at
DigitalPhotos.net

Sometimes Mrs Jones will dedicate
a whole week to a mission to half our grocery budget, rejoicing in her
achievement of saving a few pennies on a loaf or a bag of potatoes. These
periods of austerity are punctuated by spending binges when she shops like a
crazed Russian oil baron let loose in London’s West End.

7. Fluctuating sexual interest

Now both in our mid-50s, those
days of working our way through the Kama Sutra have – sadly – long gone. While
my sexual interest remains constant, albeit less than in my young adulthood, Mrs
Jones would admit that these days she can take or leave the rumpy-pumpy.
Nevertheless, it has not gone unnoticed that there is a sudden increase in her
libido in the aftermath of those rare occasions when she's witnessed an attractive woman talking to me.

Any help in de-ciphering the mysteries of my wife’s psyche
would be gratefully received. I eagerly await your comments.